


Kiss Me

by Strange_Archivist



Series: Songs for the Brokenhearted [2]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-02
Updated: 2016-11-02
Packaged: 2018-08-28 13:43:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8448220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Strange_Archivist/pseuds/Strange_Archivist
Summary: El's been back in Hawkins for about a year and things have been uneventful enough lately for her to wonder why a certain boy hasn't kissed her.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This sort of takes place about a year after events of the other Stranger Things fic I'm currently working on, but doesn't need to be read to understand his one.
> 
> El and Mike are on the late end of 14 here.

She wishes he would kiss her again. She's kissed him a few times in the year since she's been back, and each time, he's always seemed pleased, but he hasn't initiated any kisses.

She remembers the first time she kissed him, Christmas just that month and a half after her return. 

They'd been sitting in the basement, him asking if he could exchange gifts with her in private.

She had given him a new binder for his campaigns and he had nervously passed her a small box wrapped in red paper and tied with a silver bow.

“Pretty,” she'd said, smiling and taking the box from him.

“Yeah, well, Nancy helped me wrap it. I'm normally no good at wrapping presents.”

She pulled the ribbon and paper off the box, opened the box to find a watch, very different from Mike's, but she recalled the day he gave her his watch and the symbolism wasn’t lost on her.

Like then, he wrapped the wristband around her wrist and secured the jewelry on her.

He smiled at her. “This way you won't need me with my watch around to tell time anymore.”

He seemed embarrassed for some reason she couldn’t fathom, but she felt a surge of affection for him then same as she felt in the bathroom the day she saved him from the quarry. She recognized it as the same surge she felt after he'd pressed his lips to hers and suddenly, she was overcome with the urge to return the gesture. So she did.

She'd enjoyed the way his cheeks had colored under his freckles and the way he'd mumbled, “You're welcome,” to her “thank you for the watch.”

Since then, she'd watched enough movies with Nancy and had a few awkward conversations with Joyce to understand that lips together was kissing and kissing meant liking someone in a special way, maybe even loving them. And that kissing could lead to all sorts of… other activities. 

The other activities didn't appeal to her as much, but the kissing she wanted more of. Specifically from Mike. And now, after a year of a few of her chaste pecks, she can't figure why this boy who had been so eager to kiss her at twelve, won't kiss her at fourteen. 

Not one for subtlety, and feeling full of yearning from having watched The Breakfast Club the previous night and seeing those couples kiss with abandon, El asks Mike while they're in the basement, working through their respective homework assignments. 

“Mike?” she says, closing the history book she can't concentrate on anyway (a sure sign she's distracted as, having never had much exposure to the subject before, now usually finds it fascinating).

“Mmm?” he responds, not looking up from his science textbook.

“Why haven't you kissed me since that time in the cafeteria?”

That gets his attention. His head snaps up so fast, she thinks she hears his neck creak and his book slips from his hands and onto the worn carpet.

“Whu-wh-what? What are you talking about?”

“Why haven't you kissed me since then?” she repeats, trying to remain unfazed by his discomfort.

“We’ve kissed since then,” he says defensively.

“I've kissed you. You haven't kissed me.”

Mike focuses on his textbook and papers, picking them all off the floor and determinedly not looking at her.

She puts her hands over his and gently pulls the schoolwork away.

He looks up at her finally in that roundabout way and says, “I- do you want me to kiss you?”

Her heart leaps. Soars in his dark eyes. She looks into them, and says as evenly as she can manage, “yes.”

He leans into her, stretching up from his kneeling position on the floor, and places a hand on the curve of her cheek, pulling her in closer.

His lips are softer and firmer than the other few times they've kissed. Right away, this kiss is different than the others, and it's not just because he's initiated the kiss. He seems more present, like he was that first time in the cafeteria, like there's an urgency that has nothing to do with the fear of death by monster or government agent, and everything to do with wanting to kiss her.

Despite her thick sweater, she shivers.

Mike pulls away and rests his forehead against hers the way he did that night they were reunited, when she thought he might never let her go and that she might be ok with that.

“I felt bad after realizing that you might not have understood what our first kiss meant. And when you got back, I just wanted you to feel like you had people supporting you, there for you to help you recover from the Upside Down. I didn’t want to be some mouth breather perve hanging all over you.” He's not looking at her and he runs a hand through his hair. “I mean, I figured, in the lab, all you ever did was what other people wanted you to do. I figured, I should let you do what you wanted to do, you know?”

She thinks she understands and the thoughtfulness of his actions makes her want to kiss him again so she does.

“So for the past year, you wanted to kiss me?” she asks, pulling away.

He laughs, and his cheeks blush a brighter red.

“El, for the past year, nearly all I wanted to do was talk to you, or hold your hand, or kiss you.”

She blushes then too, but says, shyly, “me too.”

“Hell, just being in the same room as you is more than I ever thought I'd get. I was so scared I'd never see you again.”

“Me too,” she says again, noting the tears in his eyes and in her own as he pulls her in for a tight hug.

They hold each other longer than necessary, but after the year that separated them, long hugs never seem unwarranted.

When they finally pull apart, she says, “so now that you know I want to kiss you, will you kiss me more?”

He laughs and says, “yeah, I think I can handle that” and kisses her again to prove it.


End file.
